One Two Punch
by Sashile
Summary: One-shot, major spoilers for Knockout. Tara Kole knows, Gibbs knows, but what is DiNozzo going to do about it? Pretty much just Tiva.


**One-Two Punch**

_Disclaimer: I still don't own NCIS, but my birthday is coming up._

_Summary: Spoilers for Knockout. Gotta love the implied Tiva in that episode; I just hope it means TPTB are actually going to give us something this season. And if you really need a summary for a 1300 word episode-addition, well, that's kinda sad._

* * *

The manila envelope wasn't going to open itself. Leroy Jethro Gibbs knew that, and yet he found himself incapable of doing anything about it. He didn't know how long his finger had been on that red string that held the package closed. It could have been five minutes, or it could have been five hours. He didn't know.

_Keep it. It'll keep me honest_. Vance's words rang through Gibbs' mind, along with a conversation about a pit bull that wasn't a conversation about a pit bull at all. With a resolute air, Gibbs withdrew his finger from that red string. Rising from his stool, he crossed the basement, unlocked his rifle drawer, and placed the envelope on top of the sniper rifle before locking it again.

He had just settled back into his stool when footsteps could be heard descending his stairs. "Took you long enough, DiNozzo," he called out. The footsteps stopped in surprise before resuming.

"Wow, Boss, that was amazing. I mean, you didn't even look up and yet you knew, somehow, that it was—"

"Would you like me to smack you again, DiNozzo?"

"Yeah, what was with that, anyway? Not that I don't appreciate the gesture, but I think my brain has gotten used to the not-being-damaged thing."

Gibbs smiled slightly as he tossed a sanding block to his senior field agent. "Make yourself useful."

The two NCIS agents worked silently for a long period of time. Just as Gibbs expected, it was DiNozzo who spoke. "When'd you find out?" he finally asked. Again, Gibbs smirked.

"About half an hour after she stepped off the plane."

DiNozzo blinked. "You mean after she nearly got herself blown up in Morocco when I was agent afloat?"

Gibbs couldn't help but laugh at that. "No, the first time she stepped off the plane. When she was trying to stop us from—." He stopped in mid-sentence, but they both knew what he was thinking: _when she was trying to stop us from killing her brother_. DiNozzo felt himself flushing slightly at the thought of phone sex and charades.

"You're wrong, Boss," he finally said. "I mean, yeah, she was hot—well, she's still hot—but other than realizing that, which any human male with at least one working eye can see, I wasn't _interested_ in her. And then Jeanne—." This time, it was DiNozzo who cut himself off. Maybe he had felt something—something real—for Ziva from the beginning. But if that was true, why the hell did he agree to go along with Jenny's psycho plan for world domination? "So what do I do, Boss?" he finally asked in resignation.

"My track record with women sucks, DiNozzo." The younger man blinked, wondering if Gibbs somehow knew about that conversation with the late Director Shepard in her office years before. "Just gotta know one thing. Why are you asking me?" It took DiNozzo a minute, but he finally realized what Gibbs was saying. He all but jumped to his feet and ran for the stairs.

"Thanks, Boss!" he called over his shoulder. Gibbs could only chuckle and shake his head before returning to his boat.

* * *

Ziva David frowned in confusion as she opened her apartment door. "Hello, Tony," she said, her voice belying her confusion.

"You. Me. Dinner." He was willing to believe that it was his recent conversation with Gibbs that left him speaking in single-word sentences. He didn't want to consider that the very presence of his teammate left him incapable of forming anything more complex.

They headed down the street for an Irish pub less than a block from her apartment, the kind of place where the fiddling music in the background was loud enough to keep everyone else in the restaurant from hearing your conversation, but quiet enough that you could actually have a conversation. He was halfway through his beer before she spoke. "What was that about?" she finally asked.

"What?" he asked innocently, satisfied that the speech centers of his brain were again functioning.

"That…whatever you would call it. When the elevator doors opened when you were supposed to be escorting Ms. Kole to her car."

DiNozzo smirked at her as he lowered himself into his chair. "Jealous, Zee-vah?" he asked, drawing out the syllables of her name. She blinked in surprise, and he realized at that moment how long it had been since he had said her name that way. He hadn't realized that he had stopped. He wondered why he had stopped, and he wondered why he had started again.

"Fine," she said after a pause. "You do not have to tell me."

"Since when?" he scoffed. "You're always nagging me about my personal life."

She shrugged. "I guess I am tired of playing that game." He couldn't meet her eye, remembering the double-spoken conversation in an elevator that he hadn't realized was double-spoken until hours later.

"She asked about my dry spell." He didn't really know why he was volunteering that information, and he could tell by the arch of Ziva's eyebrows that she didn't know, either.

"I did not realize there was a dry spell, the way you are always carrying out about your dates."

"Carrying _on_," he corrected. He could remember a time when that was automatic—back when she was actually making idiomatic mistakes regularly. He realized with a start that after his teasing comment about her reverting to her old mistakes, that they had been much fewer and further between. It seemed like all of their jokes lately had been much fewer and further between. He wondered when exactly that happened.

"So tell me about this dry spell," she said, breaking the heavy silence that had fallen between them. She had that forced-casual look on her face, but she couldn't hold eye contact for longer than a few seconds. He gave a short laugh.

"You don't want to know," he told her. Well, and he didn't want to say. "I asked how I could end it. She said it was easy. I just needed to be with the right woman. And then the elevator doors opened again."

"So you did not finish that conversation."

"I'm pretty sure the conversation was over." She dropped the subject, and they finished the rest of their meal talking about Ziva's trip to Chicago. He told her she should have taken Vance up on his offer in the ring. She replied that the Secretary of the Navy would begin to get suspicious if another director of NCIS died while out of the District with Ziva as protection.

He walked her back to her apartment, where they stood in her doorway and continued their conversation, saying more and joking more that evening than they had done in months. "I think she was right," Ziva suddenly said out of the blue. He frowned at the non-sequitor.

"Who was right about what?"

"Ms. Kole," she replied, slightly impatient. "About how to end your dry spell. That it is just about being with the right woman."

He couldn't help the grin that was spreading across his face. "Are you saying what I think you're saying, Zee-vah?" He intentionally stretched those syllables again, and could tell by her returning grin that the effort wasn't wasted.

"That depends," she said, her voice at least an octave lower, her hand trailing down his chest. "Do you have your wallet?"

As she had been standing outside the car at that point, he had no idea how she had known about Tara Kole's comment, but he didn't care. He was still grinning as he followed her into the apartment.


End file.
